Yukon woman sentenced to prison in Turkey says she doesn't know what to do

Wednesday, 2 June 2021 13:39

By Dylan MacNeil

Charman Smith speaking at an online press conference this morning.

Charman Smith was given 9 years and two months when drugs were found in her luggage. She doesn't know how they got there.

A Carcross/Tagish First Nation woman serving a prison sentence in Turkey is having support from the Embassy of Canada to Turkey pulled, which could leave her without access to housing, food, and medication for her epilepsy.

According to the Congress of Aboriginal peoples, in 2016 Charman Smith was heading home after attending a conference in Kenya. A friend of hers who was a taxi driver in Whitehorse asked her to go in their place. She asked her hotel for a wake-up call. They phoned her late, leaving her just a half hour to catch her flight. The hotel told her that they would make sure her luggage made it to the airport. Smith didn’t handle the bags herself. She was transferring planes in Turkey when a drug called cutt was found in her luggage. She says she has never heard of the drug and she doesn’t know how it got there. After trial delays, Smith was sentenced to 9 years, two months in prison. She hasn’t been able to contact the taxi driver ever since.

She filled out an application to be transferred to Canada and was told it would take two years. She still hasn’t been transferred.

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the Turkish prison she was in was cleared out. She was given two weeks notice and was told she would be on her own to find accommodations. She was receiving 300 Canadian dollars a month from Canada, but last month she got an email saying she would no longer be getting the money. She says she is unable to get a worker's permit in Turkey because she doesn’t have a permanent residence.

“I’m a Canadian citizen. I’m supposed to be able to, I guess, have somebody to turn to for help, and it’s really hard, and I’m still at a loss, I don’t know what to do.” Said Smith speaking from Turkey in an online press conference this morning.

Smith is living in an apartment at the moment. She is technically under house arrest. She can go to the store and run errands, but she can not leave the country. The Congress of Aboriginal Peoples have helped her out with rent money for June and are looking at setting up a go fund me page for her.

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